With the subsequent emergence of Europay, Mastercard, and Visa (EMV) ChipCards (aka SmartCards), communications between a chip card (and card reader) and a payment system are bi-directional so that multiple data can be exchanged between them for processing financial transactions with the EMV chip cards. As a result, uni-directional interfaces such as USB-Keyboard are currently not used with EMV ChipCards. This resulted in the need for card readers that featured a bi-directional interface such as a Human Interface Device (e.g., USB-HID). USB-HID interfaces are more complex than Keyboard interfaces, and use specialized software (drivers) to access the data, and embed it into browser or native payment applications. In particular, this additional complexity of bi-directional communications and software drivers made connectivity to browser based payment applications more difficult, as an installation of a custom software driver into the PC is typically a pre-requisite to connecting to the payment application. Whereas, peripherals having the uni-direction interface systems can be used more readily without such drivers and complexity as peripherals having USB-HID interface systems.
As EMV cards started to be used, there were complaints that the EMV Chip Card systems were “slow” to complete a financial transaction mainly because the EMV chip cards were kept in the card reader for approximately 10 seconds before the card reader instructs the user to remove the card. The EMV Chip Card system is perceived as “slow” as compared to magnetic stripe transactions where the user could simply “swipe” the card, and then immediately put the card back in to their wallet. To combat this perception, the card brands (Visa, MasterCard, etc.) have created and approved a special EMV transaction sequence known as “Quick Chip” or “Fast EMV” (hereinafter referred to as Quick Chip). Quick Chip uses the same EMV chip cards that are already deployed, but speeds the payment authorization process by providing the card with pre-configured data and immediate feedback to close the transaction without waiting for a response from the back end systems. Despite the advantages of Quick Chip Card system, EMV card readers are currently designed to use a bi-directional interface from the payment application to the Host device, such as a USB-HID interface, with the difficulties and complexities mentioned above.
Desirable in the art is an improved card reader that would improve upon the conventional card readers that processes EMV chip cards.